Probably almost no one thinks about going to Rite Aid to purchase pierogies. And I certainly don’t -- think about going to Rite Aid or purchase pierogies. I go to Rite Aid unthinkingly at this point, because Rite Aid is my ATM. Why is Rite Aid my ATM? Why wouldn’t it be? Did you know you can get up to $100 cash back per purchase-transaction at Rite Aid? Ignore those card-swipe-machine suggestions of 10, 20, 30, and 40 dollars back; get at that “Other” option, and enter a hundo. Try this shit at Walgreen’s. You can’t. Walgreen’s had a cash-back limit of 40 dollars and a while back lowered it to 20. Of course, that’s $20 per purchase, so you could snag several packs of gum and have them rung up separately. But that inefficient ish gets old fast. At Rite Aid, you can pocket a Garber with each gum pack.

Now, you’re probably wondering what happens when you dial up a hundo, but the register doesn’t have that much cash. You’re thinking, it’s Rite aid, so they probably charge you and short you, i.e., fuck you. Not so fast -- this ain’t your elderly FWB’s Rite Aid. They prevent that undesirable transaction from going through, and then you get to take another crack at things. This happened to me once, when trying to keep it 100. After 100 failed, the cashier lady said she only had like 40 in there, but I called her bluff and went for 80, and she totally had it. Tough day for her -- losing both all credibility and the ability to make change for anything larger than a ten.

My favorite part about ATM’ing at Rite Aid is the "playing with house money." I’m either paying less than the usual $2.50-ish ATM fee and getting something pretty decent like Tic Tacs or Burt’s Bees or a Gatorade, or I’m getting something I really need, a household essential perhaps, on sale (because when you’re only getting one thing, it’s easy to stick to sale items) and using $2.50 of house money toward that thing. Those loss leader items that attract people to the store? I’m already at the store, and it’s for something besides items -- but I do need one item, and nothing beats choosing that one item from among the loss leaders, with house money covering the first $2.50. I don't believe I'll single-handedly put Rite Aid out of business, but Rite Aid is definitely going out of business before too long.

I will warn you: you’ll probably want to acquire a Rite Aid “Wellness” card to maximize the value you can claim at Rite Aid’s expense. The Wellness card is going to expand your selection of loss leaders and, in some cases, deepen those losses (for Rite Aid, of course). Enjoy the sign-up process, though; I always do by using as much personal information as I can remember about a high school friend I grew apart from. This can lead to humorous exchanges such as the time I forgot my Wellness card, the cashier lady asked for my phone number in order to pull it up, and I got to tell her “I used a fake phone number and I don’t remember it.” Please let me know if you’re not by now HIV-positive about becoming a full-blown ATM’er with Rite AIDS.

Sex Panthers

Last year, the back of Pittsburgh Panther football tickets had a coupon for buy-one-get-one-free Panera Pick Twos. This year, the coupon is for $2-off Pick Twos. The pros of the change include that a comrade is no longer essentially required to redeem the coupon, the cons include that the redeemer no longer gets as many dollars off, and the forest that cannot be seen for these pro/con trees is that Panera is fucking mediocre. (Panera, to my knowledge, does not serve pierogies.)